


Gold

by muttthecowcat22



Series: Yuri on Ice Oneshots [5]
Category: Yuri!!! on Ice (Anime)
Genre: Canon Compliant, Canon Universe, Domestic Fluff, Fluff, Hair Brushing, Heartbeats Zine 2018, Hugs, Love Languages, M/M, POV Victor Nikiforov, physical touch
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-03-14
Updated: 2018-03-14
Packaged: 2019-03-31 03:22:20
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,112
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13966281
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/muttthecowcat22/pseuds/muttthecowcat22
Summary: Yuuri breathed out small sighs as Victor worked through more tangles, his fists unclenching, muscles relaxing, sinking into the chair. Victor hummed a few notes from an old lullaby as he combed in the gel.“I could let you do this forever,” Yuuri said, his eyes half closed, shoulders resting heavily against the chair.“I wouldn’t mind,” Victor said as he finished the last stroke.“Really?”- Based partially on that one scene from the ending credits.  Canon compliant fluff from Victor's pov, including much hugging, hair brushing, and dog snuggling.





	Gold

**Author's Note:**

> This is my piece that was included in [Heartbeats Zine](https://heartbeatszine.tumblr.com/)! It focuses on the love language of physical touch.
> 
> Many thanks to [takeitoffhemmo](https://archiveofourown.org/users/takeitoffhemmo/pseuds/takeitoffhemmo) for initial editing!

Gold lights spilled over him as he danced, glittering among them, drawing Victor to him and the pulse of the music.  Hands glossed over Victor’s chest and around his waist, jumping away and returning surer than ever, and Victor allowed himself to be lead.  He fell into him because he had finally been allowed a taste of the sweet gold that had been kept from him for too long, and he craved it.

He sung beneath Victor’s skin and pulled smiles from his cheeks and the breath from his mouth.

And when he left, he pulled the first tears from Victor’s eyes in months.

* * *

“Yuuri still wants me here, right Makka?”

Makkachin stirred, breathing out a loud snore where she lay beside Victor, curled into their shared mat on the floor.

“Thanks, Makka,” Victor whispered into her fur, burying his face in the soft curls, pulling her closer. 

He tried not to squeeze Makkachin too tightly that night as all the unpacked boxes cast shadows around them.

Victor had flown to Hatsetsu to coach Yuuri, just as he had asked, just as Yuuri had believed in him. 

But, when he arrived, Yuuri had . . . acted strangely.  If Victor walked towards him, he jumped away. If Victor reached for his hand, he pulled back as if the touch would burn him.

And, Victor had been so sure at the banquet.  Yuuri had smiled at him unrestrained and danced with him, and . . .  and Yuuri had been drunk. And, Victor should have known that it was too good, too bright, too whole for it to be real.  But, Yuuri had said Victor’s name, said it so many times, Victor could still hear the words playing in his ears, threading gold streaks across his vision in the darkness.

Makkachin grunted in her sleep, and Victor smoothed her curls into quietness once more.  Darkness lay heavy over them. Victor could barely make out the movement of his own hand through Makkachin’s fur.  The glint of gold in Yuuri’s eyes at the banquet and the shadows of Yuuri’s wariness from earlier that day filled the darkest places of Victor’s vision.

He sat up, pulling the blanket around his shoulders, and reached across Makkachin for his phone.

Yakov still hadn’t called him.

Maybe he really had made a mistake.

He pulled his knees up to his chest and squeezed them tightly in the darkness, where no one could see him or hear him.

Or want him.

Now that he was in Hatsetsu, he had nowhere else to go.

Makkachin stirred again, audibly yawning, and began to lick Victor’s hand where he had rubbed his eyes, her tongue smooth and warm against his cool skin.

He drew in a few deep breaths.  He could handle this. Yuuri still needed a coach, even if he didn’t want Victor.  Victor would just have to try his best to fill that role. It was better than returning to St. Petersburg, running himself down, letting people tell him that he could never do anything else.

As the night stretched before him, his lungs tired and his eyes grew raw enough that he lay down beside Makkachin again, exhausted.

He dreamed of nothing, and everything, and nothing.

* * *

A week passed.  Yuuri talked to him but never reached out.  Victor hugged Makkachin to him each night as he cleared ever more boxes from his room.  His days weren’t so different than they had been in St. Petersburg. Every morning, he biked to practice with Yuuri.  Every night, he curled into bed alone, amidst thoughts of his stagnating life. The ghosts of Yuuri’s hands, the softness of his hair, haunted him.  By day, the wariness in Yuuri’s eyes scared him.

Victor had never before realized how alone he was.

Another week passed, and little Yura, or Yurio as he preferred to be called, arrived.  His rather direct personality forced a response out of the older Yuuri.

And, Yuuri ran away.   


To Minako’s.  To the skating rink.  Away. And, Victor began to wonder just how much Yuuri hid away from the world.

Victor would look back on that time, months later, and wonder if they could have had any relationship at all if Yurio hadn’t been a part of it.

And so, the day after Yurio’s arrival, Victor heard the words “I want to keep eating katsudon with you.”  They rang so many times behind his ears as he lay with Makkachin that night. 

Yuuri wanted him as his coach.   


And maybe he wanted Victor too.

Victor pushed his luck at practice and at the onsen each following day, and Yuuri shied away less every time but never reciprocated.  The  _ Eros _ program that Victor had taught him, that Victor had designed with him in mind, remained stilted, flat.  Yuuri jumped and hit the ice, clear and cruel and unforgiving, even if it could be beautiful.

And, Victor found himself at a loss – to do anything, say anything.  He wasn’t accustomed to it, to throwing someone out there alone.

And, yet, only on the ice was Yuuri determined, unyielding, gold simmering beneath his surface.  Yura scoffed at him and perfected his agape without realizing that Yuuri helped give him the determination to try.

And so, the week passed.  The last patch of snow under the cherry tree melted with it, and Victor found himself standing in a darkened Ice Castle watching Yurio flit around under the spotlight.

He glowed with the attention, white hot with his usual grit, anger, yet not agape.  He had lost it somewhere along the way, perfect, but too much so, and transformed the piece into his own monster.  Victor glimpsed the disappointment clouding his expression even from the boards. And, yet, he had done well, pushed himself more than Victor had reasoned.

He feared more for the other Yuuri, who had run to Minako during the night.  Had Victor failed him?

The applause died, and the spotlight dimmed.   


And, Victor did not want to return to St. Petersburg.   


He wanted to coach, to stay with Yuuri, but he didn’t know how to help him.  And if he couldn’t do that, then Yakov had been right after all.

Yuuri stepped up to Victor’s side, his dark costume blending with the twilight around them, small, shrinking into his own hands.

And, he hugged Victor.

There, at the boards, surrounded by everyone, and it didn’t matter.  The pressure points of his fingers weighed through Victor’s coat and into his shoulders.  His jaw brushed against Victor’s scarf. And, it was the first time that he reached for Victor.  And, Victor realized how comforting his arms could feel, how much he had longed for something similar since December, no, since years and years before, since the numbness had set in around him.

Victor ran his arms around Yuuri’s waist, thin and strong through the mesh fabric.  And, Yuuri asked for reassurance, the one thing that Victor could offer him without doubt.  He could see the gold glimmering in Yuuri’s eyes, glowing beneath his skin.

Then, he was gone again.  The air brightened as the spotlight cast his shadow on the ice.

And, he sparked to life.

The change fell sudden and complete.  His body melded with the music, his blades, the elements.  His eyes called to Victor, his arms to the audience, his feet to the ice.

It wasn’t perfect, none of it was perfect, but it was living.  He strung the gold in his veins across the ice and over the boards, not a single person spared.

A happiness welled in Victor, one that he had failed to realize in ages.  Like the first time he had won the World Championships, except it had nothing to do with himself; it was all for Yuuri.

Yuuri stepped off the ice and into Victor’s arms.  He hugged him, brief but thrumming with energy. The weight of Yuuri leaning against him rushed to his head.  And Yuuri didn’t shy away, even as Victor lectured him, even as Victor returned his arms to Yuuri’s shoulders, glowing in the feeling. 

He could stay.  He could stay in Hatsetsu.  Yuuri didn’t need him there, but he wanted him there, and he wasn’t ashamed of it.

He smiled at Victor, and it was going to be okay.  Gold flashed in his eyes and through the room, and it was all going to be okay. 

* * *

And so, Yura left as the sun set.  Victor hugged him before he climbed into Yuuko’s car.

“Ugh, get off of me, old man!”

He was bony and small, and, for just the briefest moment, his arms tightened around Victor as well.  When he pulled away, his careful grimace had been stripped from his face. He looked young, and lost, the pink sunset softening his cheeks and hair.  And, Victor had never hugged him before. 

Yura’s eyes narrowed and reddened when he glanced over Victor’s shoulder towards Yuuri, who smiled and waved, “Good luck, Yurio.”

Yura sneered.  “You too. You’re going to need it if you’re going up against me.”  And, he left.

Victor rested his hand on Yuuri’s shoulder as Yuuko’s car sped away.  Their shadows ran long and dark with the fading sun. Yuuri rested his hand briefly over Victor’s, his fingers glowing orange in the light, before he turned to go inside, his head down.

Victor had thought that he would never be able to feel the absence of another person again.

But, he had been wrong.

* * *

Yuuri’s costume hung in the doorframe to Victor’s room, sparkling deep blue and magenta.  They both stared at it, assessing. Yuuri ran his fingers across one of the gemmed shoulders.  Patches of sparkled light split across the floor.

“So, what do you think?” Victor asked.

Yuuri held up one of the sleeves, the smooth fabric running over his fingers.  “Can I actually wear this?” His eyes shone as he said it, roaming over the fabric.  A small smile covered his face, small and sad.

And Victor felt it.  He felt it, and he had no idea what to do.  He didn’t even know what it was, just something about sadness and time and –

“Let’s get you ready and try it on.  Okay?” Victor said.

Yuuri’s eyes flicked away from the costume.  “What do you mean ‘get ready?’”

“You know, fix your hair, pull out your skates.”

“Oh.”  He looked down to the sparkles lining the floor.  “But we’re at home.”

“Yes, but we still need to see what you’re really going to look like for your free skate.”

“Okay,” Yuuri paused, looking towards the costume again, “I’ll go fix my hair.”  He turned to walk towards his room, his eyes glazed over, looking through the floor. 

“Wait,” Victor called, just as Yuuri stepped into the hallway, “Can I fix your hair?”

Yuuri’s socked feet paused, his back facing Victor, the costume sparkling just beside him, a plethora of colors next to his gray sweatpants and white shirt.  When he turned, a blush burned high on his cheeks.

“Really?” he asked.

“Of course, I – uh –”  Victor’s stomach rose and fell as it had many times since he had moved to Hatsetsu.  He didn’t have a name for the feeling – just that every time he saw Yuuri, he looked more beautiful.  “It’ll be fun.” Victor pulled on a smile to cover himself. His cheeks and the bridge of his nose kindled with the movement.

Yuuri returned his gaze to the floor.  “Okay,” he said, his voice barely louder than a whisper, but his cheeks swelling in a smile.

The first stroke through Yuuri’s hair snagged a few times.  Yuuri sat in his desk chair, hands clenched together, back ballet-practice straight. 

Before Yuuri, Victor had never closely known anyone with purely black hair.  The pigmented strands slid through his fingers, each one impossibly dark. Victor adjusted his grip so that the strokes were more gentle, until they ran smoothly all the way to the back of Yuuri’s neck. 

Yuuri breathed out small sighs as Victor worked through more tangles, his fists unclenching, muscles relaxing, sinking into the chair.  Victor hummed a few notes from an old lullaby as he combed in the gel.

“I could let you do this forever,” Yuuri said, his eyes half closed, shoulders resting heavily against the chair.

“I wouldn’t mind,” Victor said as he finished the last stroke.

“Really?”

* * *

The lights still shone brightly.  The press conference had ended. Voices echoed through the complex, but the audience had departed long ago.

Victor had seen Yuuri walk off towards a hallway alone, just as a journalist had stopped Victor for a few questions.  Yuuri had not returned.                                       

Victor paced down the hallway, his shoes clacking on the polished floor.  The walls glared a bluish white as he approached the black restroom door.

Yuuri stood at one of the sinks.  He turned as Victor stepped into the room, tears streaming over the red blotches on his face for the second time that day.  His hand paused over his cheek where he had been wiping the drops away.

“Yuuri?”  Victor rushed to him, hovering.

“I’m okay.”  Yuuri drew in a shuddering breath.  “It’s just been a stressful day –” His voice cracked.  He rubbed one of his eyes. “– that’s all.” He let out a watery laugh.  “I didn’t think I could cry anymore after earlier.”

“Everything’s okay?”

Yuuri nodded his head.

“Even when –” Victor swallowed, cleared his throat.  “Even when I kissed you?” Yuuri’s eyes widened slightly.  Victor ran a hand through his hair. “I’m so – I mean, I didn’t think and it was in front of everyone, and you don’t really even like interviews so that was probably really stressful, and they asked us all those questions, and I’m just –”

“Victor.”  Yuuri rubbed one hand across his cheek as a large smile broke out over his lips.  His eyes crinkled with it, a few more tears spilling from them. “You kissed me.” He laughed, watery again.  “And, that was dumb, especially the part where we landed on the ice.” He reached for one of Victor’s gloved hands.  “But I loved it.” He wrapped his arms around Victor’s waist, spilling more tears into Victor’s shoulder.

Victor would never tire of Yuuri’s hugs.

“I loved it,” Yuuri said between shuddering breaths and shaking hands.

“I loved it,” he said, his voice wavering but warm against Victor’s neck.

“I loved it too,” Victor breathed into his hair, his arms around Yuuri’s shoulders as the shuddering faded.

“I know.”

* * *

Victor told Yuuri to give a hug to Yakov when he left him in Moscow, alone for the first time since Victor had flown to him.

Victor returned to his arms at the airport, disheveled and tired.  He hadn’t realized how much he loved them until they were gone. He hadn’t realized, until that day, that he never wanted to let go.

* * *

Victor stared at the gold band encircling his finger, still warm from Yuuri’s palm.  Yuuri looked up at him, the gold lights from the cathedral casting half his face into shadows, a question in his eyes, a matching band glimmering around his finger.

And, Victor felt so much, and he felt crippled.  The emotion wouldn’t come to his face. He didn’t know how to show Yuuri that he had never felt anything so strongly before.

The choir’s carols filled the cool air around them.  Tourists flowed through the square. And, Yuuri waited for Victor, reaching out for both of Victor’s hands to feel the ring around his finger, so that Victor would feel the ring on Yuuri’s finger as well.  Strong and warm, golden, like the night that they had met.

And, Victor hugged him then, too, just like he always did.  Every day. Nothing special. Because it was the only way that Victor knew to show Yuuri how beautiful he had become to him.

Yuuri’s breath came out in warm puffs beside his ear.  Yuuri’s arms ran around his shoulders, pulling him down to the fabric of his new coat.  He hummed with the choir, rumbling in his chest, just loud enough for Victor’s ears, transforming the tune into something familiar.

“Thank you.”  Victor’s words muffled between Yuuri’s shoulder and the wind.  “Thank you.”

Yuuri remained silent, squeezing him tighter.

* * *

Yuuri skated onto the ice without Victor.  The multicolored sparkles and intricate pattern on his costume fit him so well.  A fly-away hair had already slipped out from the bangs that Victor had so carefully combed back that morning.

And, Yuuri was going to retire.

Victor should have known.  He could see it, after everything, after all that he had learned about Yuuri.

The fluorescent lights above the ice beat down on both of them.

Victor wasn’t angry anymore.  He was just –

Yuuri flew by him in one of his warmup laps.

Victor was just heartbroken, was all.  It didn’t show on his face. He couldn’t cry by the boards, not under the lights that showed everything.  He wouldn’t ruin Yuuri’s last skate.

Yuuri made the turn of his lap as if to begin another, but he slowed as he approached Victor and grabbed his hand.

Afterwards, Victor couldn’t remember how it began, but he found himself holding onto Yuuri, the silky costume fabric and beads, the gelled hair, smooth skin, all beneath his fingertips.

And, Victor knew that they would still be together.  He knew this wasn’t the last time. But, he cried anyway, into Yuuri’s shoulder, under the lights and the cameras that would see everything.  And, Yuuri shielded him, held onto him just as strongly.

And, Victor never wanted it to end.

He didn’t want it to end.

Yuuri’s name rang over the arena, and Victor let go.

* * *

But, a silver medal wasn’t the gold that Victor knew ran in Yuuri’s heart.

And, Yuuri knew it too.

* * *

Victor stirred, warm, content to watch the snow drift past the window, filtering the morning light.  He shifted beneath Yuuri’s arm, where it lay around his waist, stretching his legs, turning to face him.

Yuuri’s eyes fluttered open, dark lashes beating with the effort, revealing a nearly amber color in the streaming light.  “Mhmmm,  _ solnyshko _ , it’s the weekend,” Yuuri mumbled.  He smoothed his hand across Victor’s shoulder.  “Go back to sleep.” He turned his head into his pillow, his hair sticking up from the back of his head.

“I know.  I was just thinking . . .” Victor trailed off.

Yuuri grumbled into the pillow.  “Go on.”

Victor chuckled.  “I was thinking that I never really hugged people before I met you.”  He pulled Yuuri closer to him, smoothing his hair.

Yuuri turned into Victor’s chest, ring sparkling as it brushed under Victor’s neck.  “Me too,” he said, his eyes slipping closed again, breaths evening out.

“I know.”

**Author's Note:**

> I hope you enjoyed reading this! Please consider leaving a kudo and/or comment. They're always so encouraging! <3


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